Cheap Words

story five · figures 13–15

The story →

CHEAP WORDS · THE ARITHMETIC HAS AN ANSWER — one household, three people, one fare · the sum a mother does in the dark after the story CHEAP WORDS · THE ARITHMETIC HAS AN ANSWER one household, three people, one fare · the sum a mother does in the dark after the story 206 the household words of proven retention 9 the nine in the tin the nine she can prove twice 240 the board, in the spring − 34 300 the board, in the new year − 94 what they have TWO ADULTS. ONE CHILD. ONE FARE THEY CAN NEARLY AFFORD. "The arithmetic has an answer and the answer is that somebody is not crossing, and every mother on this stair street has done the same sum and arrived at the same silence." THE SHORTFALL IS NOT A NUMBER IN THE STORY. IT IS THE SILENCE AFTER THE NUMBER.
13 · Cheap Words
CHEAP WORDS · THE TIN, AND WHAT IS SPENT OUTSIDE IT — nine words saved since he was born · and a bedtime story built entirely from what can be lost CHEAP WORDS · THE TIN, AND WHAT IS SPENT OUTSIDE IT nine words saved since he was born · and a bedtime story built entirely from what can be lost THE TIN ON THE SHELF said aloud on the first of every month, tap running ferry grandmother ash the name of the water always unnamed · the story does not tell us unnamed · the story does not tell us unnamed · the story does not tell us unnamed · the story does not tell us a tenth coming at the end of the month, if the tin allows THE BEDTIME STORY every word in it is a word she can afford to lose Once there was a dog, and the dog had a house, and the house had a door, and behind the door there was a bone the dog had put there. He has heard it forty times. He mouths the next bit half a beat ahead of her, and she slows down so that he stays ahead. never crosses AT SCHOOL THEY ARE TAUGHT WHICH WORDS ARE CHEAP, IN A SONG, WITH ACTIONS. HE CAN DO THE ACTIONS. The school sends home a note with a figure on it. The figure counts the dear words he has been taught and not the ones he has been saved. She reads it twice and keeps it in the tin. "It costs nothing to say and everything to spend." THE STORY IS TOLD IN THE CHEAP WORDS ON PURPOSE. THAT IS THE ART HE IS TOO YOUNG TO HEAR.
14 · Cheap Words
CHEAP WORDS · THE BLOCK IN THE CORNER — nine years old · it removes the last word of anything longer than a sentence · three consequences, in order CHEAP WORDS · THE BLOCK IN THE CORNER nine years old · it removes the last word of anything longer than a sentence · three consequences, in order THE MACHINE drops the last word of anything long and prints the count of what it removed THE MOTHER keeps her sentences short so nothing of hers is ever taken THE BOY thinks that is how stories go he has no other model of a sentence WHAT THE STORY DOES NOT SAY, AND THE DIAGRAM CAN: a nine-year-old appliance in a rented corner has shaped a child’s idea of what a sentence is, and nobody in the household has noticed, and it is not a fault — the count it prints is accurate. THE CHEAPEST DEVICE IN THE BOOK IS THE ONE THAT EDITS A FAMILY.
15 · Cheap Words

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